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BENICIO Del Toro’s latest film project, “Maldeamores” (“Lovesickness”), explores matters of the heart, but don’t expect a happy ending. The film’s tag line says it all: “Whatever your age, love is a pain the ass.”

Starring the exceptional Luis Guzm n, the dazzling Spanish-language flick – which Del Toro executive produced – is told in three interweaving stories with a strong dose of dark Latin American humor. It’s about the quest to find the elusive feeling – from a child’s first kiss, to a ridiculously sexy septuagenarian love triangle.

“It’s a trip through some of the more disenchanting aspects of love, with flawed characters and absurd situations framed in an environment of dark humor and cynicism,” says Carlitos Ruiz Ruiz, a 33-year-old Puerto Rican making his directing debut.

“Funny is funny, and this movie is funny,” says Del Toro, who took a break from working on the Che Guevara biopic “Guerilla” to talk to The Post. “I guess Puerto Rican humor is peculiar in that it could be a little rude and crude or, as they say, ‘a manos pel ‘ … Carlitos captured it – it’s a honest film.”

The Oscar winner says he didn’t go into the project to be an executive producer, but rather to help a friend whose talent he admires.

“I loved the director’s vision, I laughed out loud while reading the script, and the fact that he was a fellow Puerto Rican made it even more personal,” he says. Del Toro says that film is so good, he wished he’d been in it.

“Well, I mean that figuratively,” he explains. “You know how good films inspire actors to want to be in it? Well, that’s how I feel about this one.”

While he may not have starred in it, Del Toro’s sensibility was all over it.

It was he who phoned his buddy, fellow Rican actor Guzm n, to persuade him to come on the project.

Says Guzm n (no relation to this writer): “Benicio called me, and we met in a small plaza in Aguadilla, and he gave me the script. I read it in English and liked it a lot then I read it in Spanish and fell madly in love with it.”

The role – a cheating husband and loving father – was written with Guzm n in mind. And it’s a radically different character than the ones audiences are used to seeing Guzm n play.

“‘Maldeamores’ flowed like the spoken word,” Guzm n says. “I saw it last week, and I was almost brought to tears. It’s one of the best movies I have ever been a part of.”

“Maldeamores” also marks Puerto Rico’s contribution to the recent wave of audacious Latin American cinema that has seduced American and international audiences with its brash, raw, realistic character-driven stories. (Brazil’s “City of God,” Mexico’s “Amores Perros,” “Y Tu Mam Tambien,” “Pan’s Labyrinth” and more.)

While it’s a Puerto Rican film with a Latin American aesthetic, Ruiz and his co-director and wife, Meriem Perez, paid homage to Italian neo-realism – specifically the absurdist elements of Fellini, something he says was familiar to him.

“I grew up a child of a theater actress of the ’60s, and I remember running around backstage and bumping into a clown in full costume smoking a cigarette having a casual conversation with a glamorous actress with her boobs hanging out – you know, a diva in various stages of undress,” he says. “Just a normal day for a 6-year-old.”

Ruiz and Perez are part of a new crop of young Puerto Rican filmmakers taking advantage of the newly created Puerto Rico Film Commission. “Maldeamores” is the commission’s first project. The rest of funds came from Buena Onda Films (“City of God,” “The Constant Gardener”), which invested after hearing appeals from Del Toro.

“When I grew up, filmmaking was not deeply rooted in the culture of the island – say, like it was in Mexico, U.S. France, Germany and Italy,” Del Toro says. “Today, there are a lot of young kids really excited about film. There’s a lot of talent there, and it’s possible that filmmaking may become Puerto Rico’s national sport.”